tence, but also too far from Him for his
faith and confidence in the divine mercy not to be mixed up with a
little fear; in fact, all the essential elements of a noble prayer which
is not orthodox. Though written on the threshold of life, he might, with
few modifications, have signed it on the eve of his death; when, still
young, fate had spared him nothing, from the sweetest to the bitterest
feelings, from every deserved pleasure to every undeserved pain.

THE PRAYER OF NATURE.

Father of Light! great God of Heaven!
Hear'st thou the accents of despair?
Can guilt like man's be e'er forgiven?
Can vice atone for crimes by prayer?

Father of Light, on thee I call!
Thou seest my soul is dark within;
Thou who canst mark the sparrow's fall,
Avert from me the death of sin.

No shrine I seek, to sects unknown;
Oh, point to me the path of truth!
Thy dread omnipotence I own;
Spare, yet amend, the faults of youth.

Let bigots rear a gloomy fane,
Let superstition hail the pile,
Let priests, to spread their sable reign,
With tales of mystic rites beguile.

Shall man confine his Maker's sway
To Gothic domes of mouldering stone?
Thy temple is the face of day;
Earth, ocean, heaven, thy boundless throne.

Shall man condemn his race to hell,
Unless they bend in pompous form?
Tell us that all, for one who fell,
Must perish in the mingling storm?

Shall each pretend to reach the skies,
Yet doom his brother to expire,
Whose soul a different hope supplies,
Or doctrines less severe inspire?

Shall these, by creeds they can't expound,
Prepare a fancied bliss or woe?
Shall reptiles, grovelling on the ground,
Their great Creator's purpose know?

Shall those who live for self alone,
Whose years float on in daily crime--
Shall they by faith for guilt atone,
And live beyond the bounds of Time?

Father! no prophet's laws I seek,--
_Thy_ laws in Nature's works appear;--
I own myself corrupt and weak,
Yet will I pray, for thou wilt hear!

Thou, who canst guide the wandering star
Through trackless realms of aether's space;
Who calm'st the elemental war,
Whose hand from pole to pole I trace:

Thou, who in wisdom placed me here,
Who, when thou wilt, canst take me hence,
Ah! while I tread this earthly sphere,
Extend to me thy wide defence.

To Thee, my God, to thee I call!